A while back I bought a dress from Target. I didn’t quite get the look I wanted from it so I cut it in two pieces. I wore the top when I met my meetup group for coffee. And the skirt part became a scarfy thing.
Here are some different views of the scarf which can be worn a couple different ways…
Gap flip flops, Larry Levine jeans, top from TJMaxx, DIY’d scarfy thing, Adrienne Vittadini sweater
I have been crushing on Annie Spandex’s awesome Silence & Noise vest for a while now. While I was tempted to track it down & buy it – which is not my style – I also came across a similar vest on The Coveted that Jennine stumbled across & bought regardless of how weird it looked before she put it on. (I cannot find the actual entry so I just linked to her blog – one of my faves!) She showed a picture of it laid out flat & I thought, like I always do, “I can make that!”
I had this organic blue t-shirt material in my fabric stash for a while now & it turned out to be super perfect for this lil project:
Steps: Lay flat, fold in half, cut circle in the middle – this is where your arms go through. I guessed as I cut but you may want to use a template of some sort to make sure it turns out circular. Then, put on. Ta-da! For different fits, vary the size of the rectangle you start with. I just left mine as it was so I got lots of drape in my vest.
I can also picture it similar to below & belted. I think it’s a great shape!
Here’s my first outfit with the shredded sweater. I layered it over the bright pink tee to show off the shreds. I also cut off the sleeves of my leather/sweater jacket. I think it improves it but next time I’ll try belting it for more shape – it’s pretty much straight up & down.
Madden Girl heels, Target leggings, Make + Model tee, New York & Co sweater (shredded by me), thrifted Kmart jacket/vest, DIY bullet bracelet
P.S. I added a couple lights to my photo setup. I think it made a difference!
I FINALLY got around to doing some shredding like I’ve seen around the blogosphere so much. Childhood Flameshas a great step by step tutorial complete with a vid. Loves it!
This sweater was starting to shred on the arm anyway so I thought I’d make it look more intentional. Success! I will probably wear it & then shred it some more – it’ll be constantly new to me LOL. I was so missing wearing it – it’s a great combination of black & greys woven together. It looks like steel. This photo is crap – it looks oddly yellow. I’ll be sure to share it in an outfit post soon so you can see its true color.
Happy 4th of July everybody! What are your plans for the big weekend?
Here’s an easy way to spice up any boring pair of pumps you have hanging around. It involves painter’s tape & spray paint – the brighter, the better! I was inspired by the pair that Milla Jovavich wore in Bazaar. (They are in the 4th photo in.) I love the bright toe against the neutral shoe. I’ll be keeping my eyes open for something even more like them to mimic the look.
How to add your own cap-toe to your pumps:
Begin by taping off any part that shouldn’t get paint on it. Use low tack painter’s tape. I bought the lightest “grip” I could find. You can find it in Home Depot or any other home store.
(I failed at the prep pretty badly as the first coat went on while I only had one strip of tape & I ended up with some overspray on the shoe. This is annoying to clean up. Learn from my mistakes.)
This is after I wised up & used more tape for better protection. This would be the second coat. Another tip: You may want to (carefully) remove the tape while the first coat is wet. Then re-tape after it’s dry & you want to do the next coat. Remove tape again before paint drys.
If you don’t you’ll get something like this with jagged edges:
A final look at the finished product:
Cost of this mini-makeover: Jessica Simpson pumps – $8.99 at Goodwill or free if you use some you already own, spray paint – $6 at Michaels craft store, painters tape – probably about $3 at Home Depot.
Go forth & cap-toe your shoes!
Here’s a tip – while thrifting learn to recognize interesting details that you can remake easily. For instance, I saw this great collar last shopping trip – it’s beaded with gey pearls & rhinestones. I knew I could cut it off to make a statement collar/necklace. Easy!
Just check out how cool it looks once liberated from the dated shirt:
It might be a little too “playboy bunny” when worn with the points in front but I think worn backward it’s a great statement collar. I side bonus is that I still have the rest of the shirt to work with.
What do you think? Have you ever had one detail on a piece of clothing speak to you?
I’ve been inspired by the bullet jewelry I’ve been seeing around (here at botticellisniece.com & here at pipeline refinery, but most of all this bracelet. (If you know what blog this came from please let me know so I can credit them. I stupidly only linked to the image instead of the blog post & can’t tell from the URL.)
Anyway, whoever you are, you & your bracelet inspired the DIY tutorial to follow. Enjoy!
First thanks to my dear Dad for the supplies. He was awesome to share his stash with me! Pictured below is the final product:
My supplies: bullet casings, leather cord:
I lined them up in the pattern I wanted. I wove the leather cord in the small hole end, out the big hole end & then into the small hole end of the next one in line in an S pattern. I left some extra length at the beginning so I had something to attach to in the end. It really doesn’t show well in the pictures. If you need clarification, let me know & I will do a diagram. That might be a simpler way to see it. It took me a little while to figure out how to make this work.
Once I threaded my cord all the way to the end I started threading my way back to the start. Above & below, you can see (I was on the third casing).
Here is after finishing the threading. You can see that by tying the cords when they re-meet at the beginning, you end up with a handy loop on each end of the bracelet.
I thought about just tying it together on the wrist or adding a toggle but decided to do an elastic closure with snaps. I only ended up using one. I just cut it the length I needed & added snaps to form a loop.
This is what it looks like on with the elastic closure. I suppose you could finish it even better by attaching the elasic to the loops somehow. I ran out of patience by then. That’s me, the ADD crafter!
This is a pretty simple outfit that I used to highlight a pair of shoes I DIY’d. It’s been a long thought process to get to these as I’ll explain lower down in this post.
Initially I was inspired by the Dexter chair in the Metropolitan Homes Showtime Showhouse. It’s funny because I had the next issue of Metro Home & read a write-in where someone complained of “glamorizing violence” or whatever and referred to the chair. It piqued my sick interest so of course I tracked the chair down online. I received the earlier issue later on & this is their mini-article about the chair & the Showtime Showhouse. BTW, the “blood” is embroidered on white leather. Divine! So, liking the splash of red on the white, I started thinking about that but with shoes! I also cross-referenced this obviously macabre leaning with Louboutin’s red soles (obviously, how could I not?)
So, I got myself some shoes that I wouldn’t mind ruining. My first thought was to pick up paint at Joann’s fabric store since I’m there all the damn time. I bought the Liquitex acrylic color in Cadmium Red Deep Hue in a tube.
In the meantime I had found a puffy white heart necklace at Walmart (took me 3 tries to buy it – a story for a different day). When I first spotted it I thought immediately to dip IT in red. (By this time I had read a couple of the Twilight books & was loving Edward & that whole creepy vampire/blood thing so the heart was really more about that.) I dipped it first as the shoes wouldn’t fit in the small bowl I had. Here’s the heart necklace:
Then, I tried the paint I had on the first pair of shoes:
They’re, ahem, a little chunky due to the thickness of the paint. My dear, patient husband suggested I try the more liquid type wall paint. I took myself off to a jaunt to Lowe’s and picked up some liquid red:
And here they are. FINALLY. I’ve had this in my brain for so darn long it was getting a little uncomfortable.
I FINALLY dye-ed a couple sweaters that have been on my “makeover” pile.
Unfortunately, I don’t have before pictures so I’ll just have to describe: The hoodie is from Victoria’s Secret, was off-white & just got kind of dingy – my water does that. It’s impossible to keep whites white & most off-whites turn dingy grey after several washes. I had picked up the other sweater at TJMaxx for $1. It was white so I knew I’d have to modify it. There was also a tear at the neckline.
(Side note on how I feel about torn clothing: I’ve never been bothered by tears in clothes. I think they give them personality. Besides, I was in high school when grunge was big so I’m pretty comfortable with it. PLUS, after seeing the Elizabeth & James deconstructed tee being sold for $90 I feel that torn clothing is pretty much accepted. But I’ll have mine at a lower price point, thanks.)
I called my dad’s girlfriend & had her give me the basic steps to do it since the instructions on the dye boxes always overwhelm me. (Am I alone on this?) The two tops came out very similar in color which I had wondered about since one was white & one was more ivory. Another not unpleasant surprise, the zipper on the hoodie did NOT dye (cuz it’s synthetic?) so I ended up with a kind of modishness to the hoodie. with the effect of white piping down the front. One more thing – the neckline had actually unravelled more, which I’m digging.
Below are photos plus the super easy instructions I used. They’re not gospel but they got me to dive off the dye cliff & into some new, more wearable tops!
Simple instructions for dyeing clothes:
Set the washing machine to small load.
Let it fill, then pour in your dye. (I used two of the RIT dye boxes for 2 lightweight sweaters.)
Let it agitate for a bit while you wet your clothing in the sink or wherever.
Put the clothing in the washer, make sure it is all submerged. (Poke it with a stick!) And let it sit for 5 minutes.
Then run it through another cycle. You can dry in the dryer when it’s done.
Afterwards, be sure to clean your washer by running a cycle with bleach & detergent in it. AND, wipe up with bleach at the very end. I neglected to do this & have blue speckles everywhere now.
P.S. I’ve heard that adding salt at some point helps keep your colors true longer. I think that direction is on the box.
Happy dyeing!
I saw a pair of D&G pumps in June’s issue of Bazaar with silk ribbon that wraps around the ankle & I thought, “Wow, that’s cute! Geez, I could do that with ribbons for like $4 though.” So I did.
All I did was buy a roll of fat black satin ribbon, cut it long enough (do 2 strips the same length so both feet match). Then I looped it under the foot & crossed it over the top of the foot, wrapped it around the ankle & tied. I think they’re super cute. Kind of a more chic-er version of the infamous Lara Flynn Boyle ballet look. You really could take it as far as she did & go all the way up the calf but I don’t necessarily recommend it.
They will also look different depending on the shoe you use. I used these slingbacks because they were handy, even though I had originally pictured them on plain heels. I would love to see some tone on tone takes on this. Also flats would be adorable done up this way.
So, let me know if you try it. I’m sure you’ll all come up with some stunning things!
